Untitled

White. My first winter turns my eyes blank,
I try to catch that breath of white fog that escapes my lips,
And look at it with an unkempt awe,
of 18 years that have passed seeing foggy breath
only in movies unknown.

Yellow. Chandni calls me out from
 where her parents work. Breaking their backs.
She tells me she has left her addiction
for cartoon videos in youtube and carries a set of papers around.
She gives me a kiss.

Red. The memories of a flood that drowned our dreams
whiz past my mind. Haunting and soothing.
Resistance and a fight to overcome.

Beige. I am at home,
sleeping with my mother,
sharing one leg of an L-shaped sofa that's hardly a few inches,
our bodies, cramped like snakes,
and my father in other leg.

Green. I am walking through the rubber trees
at the backyard of my ancestral house,
watching out for rat snakes, yellow,
plucking the fresh 'kantharis' that my uncle has painfully grown.

Blue. The rough waves at Shanghumugham.
The starfish building in its park, where I've tried climbing.
The giant wheel that comes up once in a while.
The 1 km walk to the beach with my grandfather.

Crimson. Ramadan days. Cold mornings that wake us up
and evenings that paint the sky beautiful. Eid.
Spent tasting Biriyanis from every house in the neighbourhood.
Families taking recourse in each other
and the sound of a car that makes us run to the door.

Violet. Vadamalli flowers that are the hardest to pluck for Onam.
Newspapers spread on the floor,
flowers arranged in piles.

Black. Curls on which ummumma applied
thick coconut oil. My mother who tries so hard
to let her comb my hair. Mami who embarrassed me and my sister
buying lice combs for us as 7 year old girls.

Grey. Phone calls from my parents. Hours spent talking.
Laughs shared.
Kisses from across 3000 miles.

Cream. Pages of books in our big library.
Smells that I love.
Faiz and Gibran, Hosseini and Ghosh.

Vermillion. The radio that keeps playing old hindi songs and Ghazals,
Begum Akhtar, Mehdi Hassan and Jagjit Singh.
Concerts of Ghulam Ali that we've watched.
Qawwalis in Nizamuddin.
Meera bhajans that I've sung.

 Untitled. A painting.
A pallet of colours that never fade away,
but keep adding to each other.
Me.